Scintillate by Tracy Clark #BlogTour #Excerpt #Giveaway

Cora Sandoval’s mother disappeared when she was five and they were living in Ireland. Since then, her dad has been more than overprotective, and Cora is beginning to chafe under his confines. But even more troubling is the colorful light she suddenly sees around people. Everyone, that is, except herself—instead, she glows a brilliant, sparkling silver.

As she realizes the danger associated with these strange auras, Cora is inexplicably drawn to Finn, a gorgeous Irish exchange student who makes her feel safe. Their attraction is instant, magnetic, and primal—but her father disapproves, and Finn’s mother orders him home to Ireland upon hearing he’s fallen in love. After a fight with her father, Cora flees to Ireland, both to follow Finn and to look for her missing mother.

There she meets another silver-haloed person and discovers the meaning of her newfound powers and their role in a conspiracy spanning centuries—one that could change mankind forever…and end her life.

Finn leaned in and adjusted my
pillow. He was so close I could see the faintest hint of a tattoo
reaching up from his chest to his neck.

I had an intense, irrational
desire to know what the tattoo was, and it was all I could do to fight
the forceful urge to pull his T-shirt collar down for a better look.

Finn smiled a pirate’s smile,
rogue and full of mischief. His gaze flitted from my hand back to my
eyes, and I realized I had grabbed Finn’s T-shirt and still had it
wound tightly in my fist. Startled and flushing, I released
him. The impulse had been powerful, overwhelming, but how
could it make me act without any awareness or control? It was
disturbing. I drew the sheet up to my chin, wishing I could sink into
myself and disappear like a TV fading to black.

Clearly, the fever had fried a
few brain cells, but still I recognized his tattoo—three interconnected
spirals spreading like the traces of fingertips over the left side of
Finn’s chest, teasing up to his collarbone.

I’d seen the triple spiral
before. It was a symbol carved into the megalithic stones of Newgrange,
one of the world’s oldest prehistoric sites atop a grassy hill in
Ireland—older even than Stonehenge or the Great Pyramids. Though the
symbol of the three spirals had been hijacked by Celts, Wiccans, and even
Christianity over time, no one had a clue as to the original
meaning of the carving. I had a picture of it in my Ireland scrapbook.

I longed to ask him about it, to
feed my hunger for all things Irish, but I couldn’t hoist myself over
the wall of pride I’d already erected.

Not to mention swimming through
the moat of embarrassment after grabbing his shirt like an idiot.
“Sorry,” I murmured.

“Cross is okay,” Finn said, low
and husky in a way that underscored his words. “There’s not a sailor
on the planet who doesn’t love the challenge of a good storm.” I
could see the smile in his eyes and howhe fought to keep it from his
lips.

We eyed each other. A deeper gaze
than anyone besides my father had ever dared to hold
with me. It was unnerving, but I was determined not to be the first to
break it. The VIPs could smell weakness. I might be the quiet
type, but I was not in the mood to be toyed with.

Finn studied me a moment more. “Your eyes remind me of

home,” he finally said, and walked out.

About Tracy:

Tracy Clark is a young-adult writer because she believes teens deserve to know how much they matter and that regardless of what they’re going through, they aren’t alone. In other words, she writes books for her teen self.

She grew up a “Valley Girl” in Southern California but now lives in her home state of Nevada, in a small town at the base of the Sierra Foothills. Her two children teach her the art of distraction and are a continuous source of great dialogue. She’s an unapologetic dog person who is currently owned by a cat.
Tracy was the recipient of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) Work in Progress Grant. A two-time participant in the prestigious Nevada SCBWI Mentor Program where she was lucky enough to be mentored by bestselling author, Ellen Hopkins, who taught her so much about the art of writing and cured her of her ellipsis addiction.

Her debut novel was inspired by her enchantment with metaphysics as a teen, seeing it as the real magic in life. Tracy is a part-time college student, a private pilot, and an irredeemable dreamer.

1 Prize pack of a key necklace and a signed copy of Scintillate. US ONLY